The Genetics of Cattle

Since the time of domestication more than 10,000 years ago, cattle have played an increasingly crucial role in the development of human civilizations. Progress has been quite remarkable since the turn of the century; the sequencing of the bovine genome in 2009 launched new avenues for furthering our understanding of theoretical and practical aspects of cattle genetics.Covering a vast array of questions, this book reviews major topics from molecular and developmental genetics, disease resistance and immunogenetics to genetic improvement of dairy and beef breeds, addressing all current problems in the field. This second edition includes a new team of authors and completely new chapters on the genetics of fat production, nutrition, feed intake and efficiency, growth and body composition. Fully updated throughout, it provides a valuable resource on cattle genetics for researchers, breeders, veterinarians and postgraduate students.

graduated from Massey University in New Zealand in 1982 and embarked on his career in animal breeding and genetics. Much of his work has involved national genetic evaluation and its application to cost-effective improvement of livestock populations. Prior to undertaking a PhD at Cornell University, Garrick worked at Massey University on the application of animal models to evaluation and estimation of genetic trends in pig and sheep improvement. He returned to Massey in 1988 and worked on across-breed animal evaluation in dairy cattle. In 1994 he was appointed to the A.L. Rae Chair in animal breeding and genetics at Massey University, a position he has held part-time since 2002 when he relocated to the USA. In 2007 he took up the inaugural appointment to the J.L. Lush endowed chair at Iowa State University, a position named after the father of animal breeding. His current research focus involves the use of genomic information in animal improvement. Garrick has published 150 papers in refereed journals, over 200 conference papers, and 12 book chapters. He has supervised 21 PhD students and presented over 700 oral presentations at conference and industry meetings.

Since graduation from Novosibirsk State University (Russia) in 1969 A. Ruvinsky has been working in several fields of genetics for more than 40 years. He received his PhD in 1974 and Dr.Sc. in 1985. In 1986 A. Ruvinsky was elected as head of laboratory of animal genetics and 1988 as Vice Director of the Institute of Cytology and Genetics of Russian Academy of Sciences. In 1993 A. Ruvinsky joined the University of New England, Australia. Professor Ruvinsky published more than 100 refereed papers in leading genetic journals and edited 14 books so far. This includes the series of books on mammalian genetics, which currently undergoes 2nd edition. His conceptual book "Genetics and Randomness" was published in 2009.